April, 26 2023, 10:08pm EDT
MAGA Majority on Record: YES to Extreme, Harmful Cuts Against Average Americans to Protect Billionaire Tax Breaks
The extreme MAGA House Majority finally agreed on what harmful economic random demands to make as they threaten to manufacture a catastrophic default crisis and needlessly push the economy into a deep recession. And it’s nothing but a nightmare for millions of American veterans, seniors, children and workers. The MAGA majority is now on record endorsing painful cuts aimed at Americans of all walks of life — while they went out of their way to protect wealthy tax cheats and leave in place wasteful Trump tax breaks for their billionaire donors and big corporations that profiteer and offshore American jobs. “
The MAGA House majority demands everyday Americans, from veterans to seniors to children, brace for harmful cuts while they protect every cent of the debt-ballooning Trump tax breaks for billionaires and corporations. House Republicans even lined up to gut resources needed to crack down on wealthy tax cheats, a foolhardy move that actually adds over $100 billion to the debt. MAGA extremists insist millions of Americans give up health and food security, good paying manufacturing jobs, and public safety at the same time they shamelessly propose trillions more in new tax giveaways for big corporations that never trickle down to anyone else and fuel the deficit. The MAGA Majority offers nothing but a lose-lose proposition: harmful cuts that leave everyday Americans worse off – or a default crisis that crashes the economy, disrupts Social Security checks and skyrockets interest rates on car loans and mortgages. That’s no choice – that’s MAGA economic sabotage.”
Kyle Herrig, president of Accountable.US.
Every House Republican that voted for the MAGA default plan today now must answer for specific cuts that:
- Ships 100,000 Good Paying U.S. Manufacturing Jobs Overseas
- Takes away food assistance for 1 million seniors
- Guts veterans medical care including 30 million fewer outpatient visits
- Undermines public safety with 1,000 fewer rail safety inspections, 13,000 fewer law enforcement jobs, 30,000 fewer miles of track inspected annually, and shutting down 125 air traffic control towers
- Jeopardizes the over 9 million jobs expected to be created by the Inflation Reduction Act over the next decade
- Cuts food assistance for 275,000 people per month, with another 19,000 receiving smaller benefits
- Slashes Medicaid spending by $109 billion, SNAP by $11 billion, and TANF by $6 million over a decade
- Cuts $4 billion in funding for low-income students, resulting in some 60,000 fewer teachers, with 7.5 million children with disabilities would lose funding
- Results in 1,800 fewer food safety inspectors in rural communities, which could mean a production loss of $416 billion for the meat, poultry, and egg industry, plus higher prices for consumers.
- Leaves in place every special tax break and loophole for corporations under the Trump tax cuts that will add $1.7 trillion to the deficit by the end of FY 2023.
Accountable.US is a nonpartisan watchdog that exposes corruption in public life and holds government officials and corporate special interests accountable by bringing their influence and misconduct to light. In doing so, we make way for policies that advance the interests of all Americans, not just the rich and powerful.
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Police Violently Arrest University of Texas Students Protesting Genocide in Gaza
"After 205 days of genocide and almost 40,000 Palestinian martyrs, it is shameful that UT continues to invest in mass murder and resorts to brutal intimidation tactics to try to silence its own students," said one protester.
Apr 29, 2024
Around 40 peaceful pro-Palestine protesters were arrested Monday on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin as police once again violently cracked down on student-led demonstrations against their school and country's complicity in Israel's genocidal assault on Gaza.
UT students and allies are calling for not only an end to the Gaza genocide but also a suspension of U.S. military aid to Israel and the university's divestment from Israeli investments. Protesters chanted slogans including "We are being peaceful, you are being violent!", "There is no riot here, why are you wearing riot gear?", and "Let them go!" as state troopers aided by local and campus cops dragged, hauled, and even wheeled targeted individuals into custody.
"Our main goal is to get the University of Texas to divest."
Organizers said police used so-called "less-lethal" weapons including flash-bang grenades, mace, and "other chemical munitions" against protesters. National Lawyers' Guild volunteers attempted to collect information from arrestees and inform them of their rights.
"After 205 days of genocide and almost 40,000 Palestinian martyrs, it is shameful that UT continues to invest in mass murder and resorts to brutal intimidation tactics to try to silence its own students, who are bravely taking a stand against genocide," said Lenna Nasr of the Palestinian Youth Movement.
"We demand that UT divest from the Zionist state of Israel and from all institutions and companies that are enabling the current genocide in Gaza," Nasr added. "And, we demand the resignation of [UT president Jay] Hartzell for greenlighting the militarized repression of peaceful student protestors on their own campus."
Mustafa Yowell, a UT engineering student whose father is from Texas and mother is from the occupied West Bank, toldAl Jazeera: "Our main goal is to get the University of Texas to divest. Stop sending money to Israel and divest from companies that profit off of war like Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. It has nothing to do with antisemitism, or Islam, or being Arab. It's about human rights, conflict, and oppression that people face."
Police commanders eventually ordered officers to retreat from the UT campus, sparking a tremendous cheer from demonstrators, who followed and tried to block a bus loaded with arrested protesters.
Arrested students have reported mistreatment in police custody, including incidents of Islamophobia. One young Muslim woman told Al Jazeera that she was denied period products and was forced to wear blood-soiled clothing.
Some students said they did not plan on protesting but felt compelled after witnessing how police treated the nonviolent demonstrators.
"We weren't planning on doing anything like this until we saw students' heads getting smashed into the ground up the road," Joseph Ely, a graduate student and president of the Palestine Solidarity Committee at Texas State University in San Marcos, about 30 miles southwest of Austin, toldKUT News. "It was really the police at the University of Texas that provoked us to do this."
Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott weighed in on the arrests in a social media post declaring that "no encampments will be allowed."
In response, Congressman Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) accused Abbott of "escalating the situation at UT Austin and putting Texas students and journalists in danger."
Monday's arrests follow last week's violent raid on pro-Palestine protesters at UT, during which dozens of people were arrested and at least one journalist and professor were brutalized along with numerous student protesters. Monday's action also came amid a growing wave of nationwide campus demonstrations against the Gaza genocide and complicity by the U.S. government and universities.
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Leaders of the Poor People's Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival on Monday announced plans for the Mass Poor People & Low-Wage Workers' Assembly & Moral March in Washington, D.C. on June 29, just over four months before the U.S. elections.
The aim of the assembly and march is to "mobilize the one-third of the U.S. electorate who are poor and low-wage infrequent voters" as well as to pressure political leaders to embrace a 17-point agenda during the 2024 election cycle and beyond.
"It does not stand to reason—morally, economically, or politically—that in the richest nation in the history of the world, 800 people die every day from poverty and low wealth," declared Bishop William J. Barber II, co-chair of the Poor People's Campaign and president and senior lecturer of Repairers of the Breach. "Politicians then made the conscious choice to increase poverty to where it was before—an unconscionable reminder that mass poverty is a political choice, not an inevitable law of nature."
"We are here to say we must restore the moral conscience of this nation, and elect leaders across the country who will make different choices—not to raise poverty, but to lower it; not to give out tax breaks to wealthy corporations, but to those who are struggling to make ends meet," he continued. "These are the priorities of one-third of the U.S. electorate, and any candidate interested in activating these voters must speak to our issues and our values."
The agenda, revealed during the campaign's Monday press conference, is:
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- A living minimum wage of at least $15+/hour (indexed for inflation)
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- Affordable, adequate housing
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- Fully protected women's rights
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- Justice for all Indigenous nations
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"We are a resurrection of the unheard voices in this democracy, not an insurrection," said Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, co-chair of the Poor People's Campaign and director of the Kairos Center for Religions, Rights, and Social Justice. "After years of historic union drives and grassroots organizing, we are demonstrating our power at the polls in 2024. We will elect leaders with the courage to abolish poverty, raise wages, safeguard voting rights, and meet the basic needs of struggling families."
In addition to Theoharis and Barber's groups, supporters of the assembly and march include the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), Christian Church Disciples of Christ, Common Cause, Fellowship of Affirming Ministries, Good Trouble, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, Make It Plain, National Council of Churches, National Council of Jewish Women, Service Employees International Union, and Union of Southern Service Workers.
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In addition to choosing between Democratic President Joe Biden and former Republican President Donald Trump, U.S. voters in November will decide which party controls each house of Congress. There will also be various consequential local and state elections, including ballot measures to protect key rights such as access to abortion care.
"This is a crisis moment for our democracy," stressed Rosalyn Pelles, a senior advisor to the Poor People's Campaign. "In order for our nation not to continue down the path of autocracy, we need for our political leaders to become moral leaders and take seriously the needs and priorities of the millions of people struggling simply to survive."
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"ICC warrants against Israel and Hamas will offer the West a choice: Either torpedo the international criminal justice project they have advanced since 1945 for good or hypocritically demand impunity for Israeli war crimes."
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White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Monday reaffirmed the Biden administration's opposition to the International Criminal Court potentially issuing an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or other top officials related to Israel's war on the Gaza Strip.
"Would the U.S. or the White House see any potential arrests by the ICC as an aggravating factor in the negotiations?" one journalist asked about talks to end the bloodshed and free hostages.
Jean-Pierre responded: "So, we've been really clear about the ICC investigation. We do not support it. We don't believe that they have the jurisdiction. And I'm just gonna leave it there for now."
#WATCH | On International Criminal Court's (ICC) investigation into Israel's conduct in Gaza, White House press secretary Karine Jean Pierre says, "...We don't believe is in the ICC jurisdiction in this situation. We do not support the investigation. And I think that kind of… pic.twitter.com/du8NpEtLxj
— ANI (@ANI) April 29, 2024
Asked later about President Joe Biden's Sunday call with Netanyahu and whether the U.S. government is involved in any attempts to avert warrants from the Hague-based court, the press secretary echoed her previous comments.
The exchanges followed reporting that the Israeli government, in partnership with the U.S., is "making a concerted effort to head off" possible arrest warrants from the ICC targeting Netanyahu as well as Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi.
Citing two unnamed Israeli officials, Axiosreported that Netanyahu on Sunday asked Biden to help prevent the ICC from issuing warrants. A spokesperson for the White House National Security Council told the outlet that "as we have publicly said many times, the ICC has no jurisdiction in this situation and we do not support its investigation."
Neither Israel nor the United States is a party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, the treaty that established the tribunal, but Palestine accepted its jurisdiction over alleged crimes committed "in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem," in 2015.
The ICC formally launched its war crimes investigation in the occupied Palestinian territories in 2021, long before the IDF began its ongoing retaliation for the Hamas-led attack October 7 on Israel. The probe includes crimes going back to June 13, 2014.
Urging Biden "to intervene as part of the administration's ongoing commitment to Israel," U.S. Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) on Monday declared that "it would be a fatal blow to the judicial and moral standing of ICC to pursue this path against Israel."
Mark Kersten, an assistant professor at the University of the Fraser Valley, responded: "Now a Democratic senator is threatening the ICC's very existence if it does what it was created to do: Impartially and independently investigate international crimes, without fear or favor. I hope this grotesque threat and atrocity-denialism is roundly condemned."
Also noting Fetterman's comments, Alonso Gurmendi, a lecturer in international relations at King's College London, said: "They really don't realize just how isolated Western governments are on this. Even among their own populations. This won't be a fatal blow to the ICC. It will relaunch its relationship with the global majority. Fighting this will only isolate and weaken the West further."
In January, the International Court of Justice found that Israel is "plausibly" engaged in genocide in Gaza. As of Monday, the Israeli bombardment and blockade had killed at least 34,488 Palestinians in the Hamas-governed strip, injured another 77,643, left thousands more missing in bombed-out communities, and displaced around 90% of the enclave's 2.3 million people.
Since October, the United States has ramped up its billions of dollars in military support for Israel. The Biden administration has been accused of being complicit in genocide in federal court. The next hearing in the case is scheduled for June.
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